Tunisian pro-government supporters rally

Belaid, who in his car outside his home, was shot dead while by an unknown assailant. Hours after his killing Wednesday, Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali said he would form a new, technocratic government to guide the country to elections - but Ennahda, his own party, rejected that idea soon afterward.

Late Friday, Jebali renewed his proposal for a new government, which would be a key concession to the country's opposition. "I am convinced this is the best solution for the current situation in Tunisia," Jebali said, offering to resign if the elected assembly did not accept his proposed Cabinet.

Although Jebali said he was confident he could get Ennahda's support, his party's earlier rejection of the proposal exposed its own divisions between moderates and hardliners, and it remained unclear how the prime minister planned to pull enough support to his side.

But the coalition's failure to stem the country's economic crisis and stop the often-violent rise of hardline Salafi Muslims have drawn fierce criticism, especially from staunch secularists such as Belaid. He had also accused Ennahda of backing some of the political violence through its own goon squads.